Germany

This just in an hour ago:  FOX NEWS POLL - No Bounce for Obama From Overseas Trip...

The significant news coverage Barack Obama is receiving on his foreign trip has not translated into a bounce in his numbers, a just-released FOX News poll shows. Obama now holds the slimmest possible edge over John McCain, leading by just 41 percent - 40 percent in a head-to-head contest. In fact, Obama’s support is down slightly from his 45 percent - 41 percent advantage last month.

Opinion Dynamics Corp. conducted the national telephone poll of 900 registered voters for FOX News from July 22 to July 23. During that time Obama was traveling in Jordan, Israel and Palestinian territories. In the days before the poll was taken Obama had been touring Afghanistan and Iraq. The poll has a 3-point error margin.

Among independents, Obama has a narrow 2 percentage point edge: 34 percent to McCain’s 32 percent, and 34 percent undecided.

McCain has more strength of support from his party faithful. Fully 86 percent of Republicans back McCain compared to 75 percent of Democrats that back Obama.

The crowd cheered when Obama talked about bringing the Iraq war to a close. And he called on Europeans to join in the fight against global warming, AIDS and human rights abuses in Africa and Asia.

“People of Berlin, people of the world, this is our moment. This is our time,” he said.

Earlier, he sought to limit comparisons to famous speeches that Presidents John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan made in Berlin during the Cold War.

“They were presidents, I am a citizen,” he told reporters ahead of the speech, claiming the event was not a political rally.

John McCain, meanwhile, visited a German restaurant in Columbus, Ohio, where he poked fun at Obama.

Heh.

From the Fox News Poll PDF for 22-23 Jul 08

If the 2008 presidential election were held today, would you vote for:

1. Democrat Barack Obama
2. Republican John McCain
3. Independent Ralph Nader
4. Libertarian Bob Barr
5. (Other)
6. (Don’t know)
7. (Would not vote)

 Obama   McCain      Nader      Barr        (Other)      (DK)      (Not vote)
  40%         37%            2%         -            1%       17%         2%

I like 2% for Nader.  Wasn't that the gap between Ford and Jimmy Carter? 

Obama?  Oh, blah blah.  Yawn.  Whatever. 

Pass me those brats and that Berliner Kindl Weisse, bitte? 

This is pretty extraordinary. A candidate for the American Presidency is using flyers printed in German to turn people out for his campaign rally in Berlin on Thursday. This flyer can be found on a bilingual page on BarackObama.com advertising the event:

The German flyers bear Obama's campaign logo and say "Paid for by Obama for America."

I'm surprised at this lapse in judgment in an otherwise well-oiled and professional Obama campaign. The last time they printed up campaign paraphenalia in a foreign language, it didn't work out so hot for them.

So, this isn't just some sober, high-minded foreign policy speech, part of a foreign trip occurring under the auspices of his official Senate office. It is a campaign rally occuring on foreign soil. They are using the same tactics to turn out Germans to an event as they would to any rally right here in America. This after Obama's campaign said this:

“It is not going to be a political speech,” said a senior foreign policy adviser, who spoke to reporters on background. “When the president of the United States goes and gives a speech, it is not a political speech or a political rally.

“But he is not president of the United States,” a reporter reminded the adviser.

The sea of Germans drummed up by the Obama campaign will be used as props to tell us Americans how to vote, and the campaign isn't trying to pretend otherwise. That's breathtakingly arrogant, and par for the course for Barack Obama.